BSU could have taken the top two prizes had it combined its two home security projects: Smart LockInterCom and e-Spy Mobile Security. On its own, the two projects were good but not good enough to break into the top three.

The home security project that won second place, Smart House, was better than the two BSU projects individually in that it offered both security (alarms, SMS notifications) and convenience (turning lights and appliances on and off through SMS).

CONTROLLED THROUGH SMS. The project model of Bulacan State University’s Smart LockInterCom. The system allows you to open and lock doors and windows using a Java application in your phone that provides a visual interface to the SMS commands. Click on photo to view larger image.

Smart LockInterCom allows people to open and close doors and windows in their houses using SMS. The team that created the system also created a Java application that simplifies the process in your cell phone. The Java application provides a visual representation of your house or office and you can just click on doors to either open or lock it. The application also indicates which doors are locked.

It is that Java application that differentiates the project from others like it. The second place winner, Systems Plus College Foundation, only created the security system and you had to control it by sending SMS codes.

The administrator of the Smart LockInterCom system is also informed on who opened which door using their phones. The security system comes with a keypad with display for the main door. A button in the keypad allows a guest to call the owner on his or her phone. The owner can then let the guest in by sending a command for the system to open the door.

E-spy Mobile Security, on the other hands, is a system that detects intrusions, captures video of the intruder, alerts the owner, and then uploads the security video into a website.

It uses a laser to detect unauthorized entry. When the beam is cut, the system is triggered and a flood light turns on to illuminate the area where the intruder entered. A camera then captures video footage of the intrusion and then save the clip into the server. The server, aside from storing the video clip, processes it from an AVI file (which is huge) into a GIF file. The server then uploads this animated GIF into a web server for offline storage.

The owner, after being alerted of the intrusion, can then go to the website and download the animated GIF to view the intrusion.

The project, however, still has a few kinks. The system couldn’t record a few seconds after the alarm is tripped. I also spotted an error prompt in the server during the judging. The error prompt indicated that the .avi to .gif conversion had failed.